SEL1670Z vs kit SEL1650PZ

Posted without comment are some comparison shots of a completely boring, flat scene (shot from my deck) under a variety of focal lengths and apertures, in an effort to compare the two midrange zooms for the E-mount APS-c.

These are all full sized JPEG images exported from RAW files via LR5. The only processing was:

Application of the respective Adobe profiles for each lens (you really don't want to see the uncorrected RAW files for the 1650PZ, unless you like funhouse mirrors), and a minor crop applied to the 1650PZ shots, as its listed focal length is a bit pessimistic, by about 2mm to the wide side (or maybe the Zeiss is 2mm optimistic, IDK, but Lightroom showed the same length in the metadata for each lens).

White balance changed to a custom level (originals were shot at auto WB, I corrected via sample of the street surface).

Otherwise the shots are unmolested. Camera setting was "A", RAW+JPEG, Fine. All at ISO 100. No lens filters employed. The full set of comparison images is in my gallery here.

I'm not sure what, if any, conclusion can be drawn from this, as it's not a particularly challenging scene. The Zeiss does seem to have a bit more dynamic range, and the edge sharpness is pretty much better across the board. Whether it's $500 better or not is the debate, I guess.